When you choose to be positive, you choose your future. — Unknown
Woke up way too early again on a Saturday morning. I have been working through a lot of personal stuff and the thoughts are noisy and intrusive. I’ve always loved Brené Brown’s advice to sit in the discomfort of one’s vulnerability, because exposure to discomfort builds tolerance and resilience. So I’m choosing to sit with the head full of noise. Picking out the strands that I can pick out will help, and telling myself those that I can’t can stay jumbled. They’re for sorting out another day.
@yellywelly
We’re told these days that we can choose our future, that we can control what happens to us. If we manifest using specific words, if we behave a certain way, if we one day decide to radically change our lives in pursuit of the future we want, if we eat less/more of certain foods…it all boils down to controlling something we haven’t even experienced yet.
The only thing we can control is how we react to our environment. We react to our environment through small daily actions that become routine and habitual. When things become routine, they become predictable. This is how you can predict the future.
“But predictable is boring!” I’m sure a lot of you will say. And to that I say, NO IT IS NOT! When we habitually strive to find joy, when we routinely try to look for the positive, it becomes second nature, it becomes part of who we are, and that’s how we bake positivity and hope into our future. When we choose to view everything as potentially filled with light and joy, we choose a future filled with exactly that. The future will always be an unknown quantity, but if we sit with the knowledge that, whatever it is, there will always be hope that it could be shining, shimmering, splendid, that is the exciting part of it all.
What small thing will you do today that your future self will thank you for?
I’ve heard it said so many times and in a multitude of iterations: If you have something to do, do it. Do it now. Before fear or self-doubt takes hold!
I’m a planner…and a procrastinator. I hide the procrastination behind beautifully engineered plans that are, eventually, expertly executed. My mom was also famously a don’t-do-until-due person. She did everything flawlessly too, but under great haste. I always used to joke that my procrastination was genetic.
One day, I read somewhere that procrastination was fear of failure in disguise. And THAT was a lightbulb moment. It felt like a string of fairly lights started twinkling! In my case, it was most certainly the most lethal of combinations: my need for perfection and my fear of failure. I was putting off doing things because my nervous system saw the situation or task as a threat — because in my head I was going to fail spectacularly, people would l see me as a fraud, and I would again, get tangible proof that I am inept, incapable, and a complete impostor.
I am learning to stop listening to the Negative Nancy in my head. Because I know what I can do and I am actually really capable. I am learning to face the wall of anxiety and tackle the paralysis. I am:
🏷️ Naming it: Fear of failure / missing the mark
🔨 Breaking it down into manageable tasks
⏱️ Giving myself 10/15 mins to accomplish tasks
🧘🏻♀️Forcing myself to breathe through the anxiety.
I am a work in progress. But I am naming my imperfections. I am naming my fears. I am facing them. Slowly. Surely. One by one.
I know that every day is different. Life, these days, seems to be more challenging than usual. So many people have been saying that they’re finding everyday that little bit more difficult.
I’d like a purely good day, though. One where I don’t have to pivot the mindset. I know the low mood might have something to do with my recent anxiety issues. Nevertheless, I’d like a really good day, please. Or at least a pause in the sleep deprivation, the overthinking, and the over-worrying. I’m exhausted.
I’d really like to have the opportunity to get off the spinning world for a bit and just be in a bubble.
Yes, yes, I realise that that might be called a vacation. But going away for a holiday is a band-aid. I’d like to not to rip the band-aid off. I realise that there is a lot of work to be done and I am prepared to work. But really, I’d just like a sunshiny, smiley, happy day.
Success is a journey, and every single day is a beautiful mile. — Unknown
I’m going through quite an anxious period in my life. Because it feels like everything is up in the air and I don’t necessarily know which way is up. I have this list of (inspirational) quotes and, because I’m pedantic and persnickety (I also like old, interesting terms), I will go through the list, one item at a time, in order. I’m in the section of my quotes that seems to be one quote after another about success. It’s making me anxious because, what have I got to say about success? My current situation feels more like a disaster, and so far removed from success.
But okay, let’s not make this about me. Or at least, let’s try.
What is your definition of success? Some people are planners, and success is ticking off items on a list to get to the end of a project. Some people are thinkers, and success is finally arriving at a conclusion after testing ideas. Some people are creatives, and success is finally breathing life into a body of work. But all this is success in relation to productivity. For some people, there is no need to produce; success is being able to have a good day, to have a chance to laugh, to breathe, to just be.
Is it just me, or does society these days focus on having something to point to, where we say, “I made that!” It just feels like we’re on this perpetual hamster wheel of production. It feels like everything has become a commodity and the measure of success relates to a list of assets, and in order to build that list, one has to either produce or acquire.
I enjoy pace and I enjoy the challenge of finding solutions right away. I know I can sprint along with the best of them. But lately, I’ve been feeling exhausted. I’ve been questioning the constant need to chase…everything. Maybe this is why I feel so lost, so disconnected. Maybe I’m missing being able to have time and space. Because while I know I can do things quickly and efficiently, I like to be able to process, at a pace that is my own, in an environment that is less frenzied and frantic. But when success is only measured by what you can show for yourself, the journey — the wrestling, the questioning, the becoming — gets dismissed as inefficiency. But that part of the journey is where the real work happens.
Have we forgotten to appreciate the time it takes to travel? Have we forgotten that the journey isn’t just merely arriving at the destination? Have we forgotten that it’s the experiences between departure and arrival that make the journey? That’s where the lessons are learned. That’s where the memories are made. That’s where the experience is created, where expertise is gained. Because while you have a destination in mind, the things that happen in between change where you get to.
Tomorrow is not a threat. It is a promise.— Unknown
I’ve been going through a really anxious period in my life, filled with uncertainty. I’ve been vacillating between feeling convicted that I’m doing the right thing, and then doubting my decision to put myself (my health and my self-advocacy) first. I’ve not been sleeping. I think my subconscious has been dreading the future because there is so much uncertainty about it, and it has been preventing my brain from switching off and resting, thinking there is danger when I get to tomorrow.
When you are a person who lives with anxiety, the future is something that is an unknown space where anything and everything can (and if your anxiety is to be believed) and will go wrong. But that’s the thing. Tomorrow, the future, is unknown. So while there is the possibility that things could go wrong, there is also the equal possibility that things could go VERY right.
Maybe that’s the reframe that needs to happen: tomorrow, the future, IS NOT a guarantee of danger. There is every chance that things could go very right. Maybe that possibility is the best thing to hold on to.
Yes I am writing again. And no, I didn’t go on a writing sabbatical (as is my perennial excuse for being a lazy so and so).
I just haven’t been visited by the writing muses lately and real life adulting has been keeping me busy and most days absolutely shattered. By the time I get home, I’m more than ready to go to bed. But of course, there’s still dinner to be made and eaten and dishes to be washed. Some days, I really would just like to get in, lock the door behind me, take of my shoes, put down my bag, take a shower and go to bed. I’ve neglected all forms of creative pursuits – writing, crocheting, sewing. All my creative endeavours have been put on an extended pause until I find the motivation to start working with my hands again.
I’ve been feeling very down in the dumps lately. Maybe it’s the hay fever, but I feel like I have this blanket of general dissatisfaction about everything weighing me down. I try to busy myself and just keep my head down and just keep chugging along, ticking off one task after the other. If I keep myself busy, I stop noticing the little things that make me grind my teeth in annoyance. I try to smile through everything, be kind, be helpful, be pleasant and biddable, because that’s what’s expected (and I know that it’s not good for my mental health, all this tamping down of feelings). But there are days when I just want to shout in frustration and demand that people take care of me for a change. I keep wondering whether people would notice if I disappeared. I know…dark thoughts. I’m probably just feeling a bit neglected, taken for granted and a little invisible.
I do, however, want to write more. I have a hashtag that I use a lot on my Instagram stories (please follow me — I’m @yellywelly on Instagram and Twitter) – #girlonthetrainfeels. Yes, very, very inspired by Paula Hawkins’ book The Girl On The Train, which I loved and read several times over. Because, I am, for all intents and purposes a girl on the train. I commute to work on a train. I’ve been asked by people to write about my train journeys because my Instagram stories make them laugh.
I need to get writing. What I’m afraid if is that people will think I’m mean. Because I make up names for the people that get on the same train as me – the regulars. I also wonder about them, and have observations. I don’t think I’m being mean-spirited. It’s just a bit of fun on the train whilst I’m waiting for the train to roll onto my platform so I can get off and go to work.
I wonder if people will be interested in reading my stories and musings….
Just writing thoughts down. This post has completely no purpose except to vent.
Time flies when you’re having fun…and even if you’re not!
I can’t believe we’re half-way through with 2016! Someone once said that you know you’re getting older when time flies past so quickly. If that’s the case, then I’m definitely ancient. I find myself thinking more often than not, “Stop the world, I want to get off!”
Sometimes I get home and I want to just completely switch off. Just go to bed and pull the covers over my head and just sleep. But I can’t because there are chores to be done, food to be cooked, a kitchen to be cleaned. Then after all that, sometimes I wonder if I’m just wandering around life, walking in somnambulistic circles? I find that I’m asking myself all sorts of existential questions which scare me.
I find that a recurrent thought is me to have proper downtime. For me to just lie in bed. To not be responsible for anything. For me to have a day when no one asks me to do anything for anyone. For me to be alone with my books and my thoughts and my dreams. For me to sit at a coffee shop window, nurse a huge cup of coffee and watch the world go by.
I think I now understand what it is now to have social media fatigue. Ever since I moved to England, I’ve been online all the time. I’ve worked really hard to make the thousands of miles between me and my family and friends appear small and insignificant. I’ve invested in tech so that I can get in touch, be in touch and be accessible to everyone back home 24/7. There are days, however, when I want to completely switch off. To not bother catching up on tweets, Instagram, look at Facebook posts, catch up on LinkedIn (which, I might add, I haven’t really totally wrapped my mind around, even though LinkedIn says I’ve got an “all star” profile, whatever that means!), and to not care about work emails and how many emails I have in my Outlook inbox.
Mark Babbitt said that “[w]hen you realize you’ve stopped contributing original thought to a conversation, you are suffering from Social Media Fatigue. It is time to step away and take a social-less vacation.”
I think I need another break. A long one where I’m allowed to just walk, take pictures, enjoy my little seaside town, and not be responsible for anyone or anything, to completely switch off. To not worry about tax investigations or HMRC correspondence for clients. To not worry about family and if they’re all okay. I need to refill my spirit tank. I need to replenish my cheerful me supplies, restock my happiness cupboard.
I think that’s my goal for the next half of 2016. To find time for me. I have experienced burnout and that wasn’t a very good place to be in. I need to take care of me because no one else will do that.
Yellywelly 